Hiring Help

Josiah_9

I work for a small service industry company, and we need to replace our office assistant. My boss is to busy to deal with finding and hiring some one. I have posted on criagslist and recived about 50 responses in 10 hours. I was just wondering if anyone had any tips for slecting the right person.

Erios

Josiah_9 wrote: »

I work for a small service industry company, and we need to replace our office assistant. My boss is to busy to deal with finding and hiring some one. I have posted on criagslist and recived about 50 responses in 10 hours. I was just wondering if anyone had any tips for slecting the right person.

Moving to operations to New York and getting me a side source of income. My best advice is to trust your unconscious multivariate processing. Just flip through resumes and coverletters and if it's not automatically "good" in your mind, scratch it. With 50 applicants in 10 hours (damn), you can afford and perhaps are expected to be a bit arbitrary. From there, you can come up with more stringent criteria.

Szechuanosaurus

This is why a lot of companies use recruitment agencies - they filter out a lot of the chaff for you. Via craiglist, it'll be a miracle if there are one or two suitable candidates. For an office assistant position, there is highly likely to be a recruitment agency that deals specifically with office assistant/administrative staff etc. in your city. They would probably also run as a temp agency, so you could 'try before you buy' so to speak. Get a temp in, if they're good, see if they'd like a full-time position, if they are terrible, get a new temp next week, rinse, repeat if necessary.

The Crowing One

Erios has the right idea. There's a reason why most larger companies/organizations use a "keyword" search to thin out their piles, because giving 100% (hell, even 50%) of the attention required to make THE CALL would simply drag the process out for months.

Read the cover letter, flip through. Sort them into piles, "Yes" "Maybe" "No." You should know what you're looking for, and it shouldn't take long to say "This guy has only worked at Target, and for only 3 months... No. This woman worked as a receptionist at a law firm for three and a half years, and before that she held x job for five years... Yes." Ask your boss if there is anything he would want you to look for in particular.

You need a system for sorting these. I promise your boss will smile when you bring him stacks of resumes already sorted by fitness.

Josiah_9

The Crowing One wrote: »

You need a system for sorting these. I promise your boss will smile when you bring him stacks of resumes already sorted by fitness.

Yeah, as I am sure is true of most buisness right now, we are slow so I have ample time to sort.

Cyd Cyclone

As The Crowing One said, filter the Resumes as soon as possible, it really speeds things up. Keep an eye out for unrelated work experience, and colourful euphemisms for "I work super hard and am good at everything." Read each Cover Letter to see if it explains the Resume, but also if it explains the goals of the person. You can quickly eliminate the people who aren't interested in long time work by looking at Resumes for things like travel wishes. It takes time, but it's better not to accidentally interview someone who doesn't even qualify for the job.

At my bookstore, we use the 1 week temp system to try out employees. It gives you a chance to see the person in action. The most important advice I can give, however, is to always trust you gut instinct. If you don't think they will work out, axe them quickly. It saves a lot of time, and headaches later.